.....because its bound to end in tears.....
Since joining Retrobike a couple of years ago and becoming hopelessly addicted to re-building my old MTB's I have spent a lot of money but I must admit I've had a lot of fun...
So when I was advised to come on here to re-live my mid-school BMX years I was a little worried.....
Anyway, my story...
When I was at Uni my MTB was proving very expensive to keep running as I was riding a lot. A mate of mine was into BMX and bought a Heavy Tools Ruler. I sold my MTB to release some cash and got the same bike. After reading a couple of things on here I must say they were a bit cack - a Standard copy really. Both of our bikes had misaligned rear drops which bent your rear axle really easily.
My mate cracked his eventually at the dropouts and I sold mine.
During this time we always went street riding and to Rehab in Wakefield every Wed. We were very fortunate to be able to ride with, and watch, Jamie Bestwick. He was amazing, and when he got his full-time sponsorship so he could quit work he just went mental. Such a nice bloke too, as were all the guys there. We also used to ride with the Hudds skater and the Leeds riders occasionally.
I bought a Dragonfly Double Dynamite which I LOVED. I was more into flat/tech riding to be honest (and was very poor at that) but it didn't matter, you just had the one bike and did everything on it - it makes me sad that flatland bikes are so specific nowadays. BITD the big pros, Hoffman/McCoy all could ride flat and had gotten very skilled all round riders because of it but it's gone all kooky now IMHO.
Anyway eventually I sold the Dragonfly because it only had a 1" headtube and I wanted to get new forks. I had a KHE Premium Lagger but it was a nightmare for so many reasons, awful brake locations, weird geometry, badly made..........
So I got a WTP Pony as it was the closest I could get to a Standard that I wanted and it turned out to be brilliant. Pics below!
This was pretty much my dream set-up (although I don't know why I sold my Castillo bars for Odyssey Milk bars as they were very similar).
Odyssey forks (I think), Standard stem flipped and filed to be knee friendly, Primo Hemorroid saddles, Primo post, CNC brake splitters, AD990's, ODI grips, Profile cranks with rack spider and blue ano ring. G-sport front hub on a Sun BFR and my favourite bit which took years of refining - Static Freecoaster. For those that don't remember or didn't know, this was a Suntour coaster hub with the flanges welded up and converted to a freecoaster internals, with a longer axle. I modified it further inside to adjust it to my liking and also welded on a 11t stainless cog onto the driver unit (so I could use a smaller front chainring!) and upgraded the axle to a Standard heat treated one (which I never bent). Standard Hand Grenade copy front pegs in Ali and rear T1 steel/ali pegs on the back for grinding (these had just come out and were the first time someone had made them when the photos were taken).
Us guys (me, Rich, Sparky, Matt etc) used to ride Hudds all the time, what great days!
I loved that bike but work and stuff meant I had less time to ride and everyone else gave up. I never like riding on my own so I sold the bike before it lost too much value.
I remember long days watching and re-watching all the early Props videos, Standard Style Cats (still my fav), Poorboy 500 miles, Madd Matt, ....etc
So maybe I'll be looking out to rebuild my Dragonfly, maybe tootle around at the local tennis courts?
It's going to end badly, isn't it?
